This blog follows me, Raewyn MacG, around (hopefully) the world. Currently, I am based in back in New Zealand having returned from JET in August 2010. Still traveling, still having adventures, just not as many.

I decided to go to Hampton Court Place in the morning and walked around in some of the same places that Henry the Eighth once walked. I generally had a really lovely time. It was beautiful out there.

Hampton Court is 30 minutes by train from Waterloo Station. It takes you through Wimbledon (I took a photo of the station for my Japanese friends) and out to the countryside. When I got out of the train at Hampton Court Station I was awestruck by the country village feel of the place. It was, what I would deem, quintessential England. I really liked it.

The palace itself was pretty awesome by 16th/17th century standards. To me, it looked just like Knox College in Dunedin but maybe that's just me seeing something that isn't because it was built from red brick? It's massive too. There's 2 huge courtyards and Henry VIII's apartments were not exactly small either. Neither were Mary the 2nd's or William the 3rd's. The gardens were fantastic and immense. They also have a royal tennis court in there. The court was allwed in and they used the walls to bounce the ball off as well. It was really interesting to watch whatever match was going on in there for the short time that I did. I thought it looked a little bit like squash.

I was at Hampton Court Palace for about 3 hours-ish then I decided to call it a day and go back to my sister's house. I got home about 4pm and just chilled out for the rest of the afternoon/evening. We went to Tesco and got some NZ Lamb Steaks (cost a bomb but tasted AMAZING) and roasted veges on a bed of spinach for dinner. It was so so very good. My big sister is an amazing cook.I've really missed eating NZ meat in Japan. That day I was liking England because you can buy many many things from home there.Sadly, though, I recently had to throw out half a box of vitaweat because I'd let it get past it's use by date and the packet was open so they'd gone soft and icky anyway.